Talbot: Tech makes hard, but right call in firing Kingsbury

Texas Tech fired head football coach Kliff Kingsbury on Sunday, one day after a 34-24 loss to Baylor in Arlington left him with a 35-40 record overall and 19-35 in Big 12 games.

Photo: John Weast / Getty Images

There was an outpouring of support for Kliff Kingsbury across social media late Saturday night.

But, it was not for what Kingsbury accomplished at Texas Tech.

It was more akin to a funeral — everyone wanted to say a few kind words to the coach they cared about.

They knew what was coming Sunday.

Patrick Mahomes II, the Kansas City Chiefs phenom quarterback and perhaps the most high profile athlete ever to don a Red Raiders uniform, tweeted out, “Thank you @TTUKingsbury for everything you have done for me and Texas Tech University! You believed in me when very few people did and helped me become the quarterback and person I am today!”

The kind words did not matter.

Nor should they have.

Kingsbury was fired less than 24 hours after Saturday’s 35-24 loss to Baylor and yet another 5-7 season.

As Texas Tech athletic director Kirby Hocutt said on Thursday, “Yes, there have been times that we’ve seen progress made this year, but when you’re 5-6 it’s hard to hold your hat on a lot of that progress because at the end of the day the only thing that matters is our record.”

Right or wrong, winning is what matters more than anything in college football, and Kingsbury just couldn’t get it done in Lubbock, no matter how hard he tried.

There are numerous stories about how the former New Braunfels star quarterback eschewed his social life, showed up at 5 a.m., left late and did everything he could to take Texas Tech to the next level.

It didn’t matter.

In the end, Kingsbury is who he is — one of the best offensive minds in college football and someone who put Texas Tech and his job above all else.

The former Tech quarterback probably already has job offers from offensively maligned teams that need a genius coordinator to light up the scoreboard.

But he is a mediocre head coach.

There was no way to know that, though, when Kingsbury was hired with high expectations and unprecedented excitement after Tommy Tuberville’s resignation following the 2012 season. His name got even hotter after Texas Tech started 7-0.

But nothing ever seemed to line up for him or the Red Raiders from there. They lost their last five regular-season games before upsetting Arizona State at the Holiday Bowl.

Poor defense negated his blistering Air Raid offense, and the Red Raiders lost four games over the course of the 2015 and 2016 seasons in which they scored more than 50 points.

Against Oklahoma in 2016, Mahomes threw 88 times for 734 yards, which tied an NCAA record. He ran 12 times for 85 yards, which gave him a record 819 total yards.

And he lost, 66-59.

Under Kingsbury, the Red Raiders failed to break .500 every year in Big 12 play, extending that streak to nine seasons in a row. He finished 35-40 overall and 19-35 in Big 12 games.

Had freshman quarterback Alan Bowman not suffered a collapsed lung against West Virginia and again against Oklahoma, there’s a good chance the Red Raiders would have won seven or eight games this season.

Hocutt, though, seems tired of excuses.

“This decision was made based on a three-year pattern of inconsistency,” Hocutt said. “We didn’t come here to win five, six, five games, for our football season to end in November. There was a pattern of inconsistency that led to this decision at this time.”

Still, excuse after excuse was made on Texas Tech social media Saturday night — no one would come to Lubbock or love it like Kingsbury. Or that any coach hired would just want to spin it into a bigger and better job.

Others decried how Kingsbury did things the right way.

None of that is true.

When it came to winning football games, Kingsbury did what every other coach in the NCAA does — what it takes.

Texas Tech’s best defensive player the past two seasons was Dakota Allen. But, the linebacker also had to sit out a year after being arrested on a charge of burglary, a second-degree felony. All charges were eventually dropped, but Allen, who enrolled at East Mississippi Community College for that year, admitted on the Netflix documentary Last Chance U that few teams were willing to give him a second chance.

Kingsbury also allowed Jett Duffey to play. The backup quarterback, who was pressed into duty when Bowman went down, was suspended from the university for two semesters after a three-person Title IX panel found him responsible for two counts of sexual misconduct.

In March, Duffey and three others were suspended from the team following their arrests after a disturbance near a Lubbock nightclub. In the fall, he started three games, threw for more than 1,200 yards and led the Red Raiders in rushing.

Maybe those players deserved those second (and third) chances.

Most people do.

I am certain Allen did. Hopefully, that’s why Kingsbury allowed them back on the team.

But, they were also crucial to the Red Raiders winning football games and Kingsbury keeping his job.

As for Lubbock, which most people think is the middle of nowhere?

Texas Tech has some of the best facilities in the nation and, Lubbock, some might be surprised to find out, is the third-largest city in the Big 12. It’s also twice as populous as Tuscaloosa, Ala., which really is in the middle of nowhere.

Heck, it isn’t even in Texas and only has two Whataburgers.

Lubbock has nine.

Regardless of those obvious setbacks, I’ve heard the Crimson Tide have a pretty good football team.

If that isn’t a good enough argument, take a look at the football programs in glorious cities such as Ames, Iowa and Stillwater, Oklahoma. They aren’t Bama — no team is — but they are in a lot better shape than the program in Lubbock.

And Hocutt, who spent two seasons as the chairman of the College Football Playoff committee, is tired of finishing behind them in the standings.

He saw what it takes to be at the top.

Now, the Texas Tech AD is accepting no substitute.

“We will be elite in football again,” Hocutt said Sunday. “I guarantee you, we will be elite in football again. This program has been there before and will get there again. We will bring back our edge.”

According to the Lubbock Avalanche-Journal, Tech owes Kingsbury $1.95 million — half of what he was scheduled to make for the 2019 season — by Jan. 5, 2020, and $2.05 million — half of what he was to make for the 2020 season — by Jan. 5, 2021.